Keep Leading!® Podcast Episode 019 | Be the Spark | Simon T. Bailey

Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Keep Leading Podcast. I’m your host Eddie Turner, the Leadership Excelerator.In today’s competitive business world, there is no place for lackluster performance. When you find your spark, you shine brilliantly against a backdrop of automation, algorithms, and autonomous cars, you realize you weren’t just hired to do a job. Your purpose is to surpass all expectations and create memorable moments that surprise and delight your customers. Your spark is what distinguishes you from the pack and you have the opportunity to be the spark for your company, your customers, and your employees. You want to listen to this episode so you learn how to be the spark. You’ll learn that and more from the world renowned hall of fame speaker Simon T. Bailey, right after this.

Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Keep Leading Podcast, the podcast dedicated to leadership development and insights. I’m your host Eddie Turner, the Leadership Excelerator. I work with leaders to accelerate performance and drive impact.In today’s competitive business world, there is no place for lackluster performance. When you find your spark, you shine brilliantly against a backdrop of automation, algorithms, and autonomous cars, you realize you weren’t just hired to do a job. Your purpose is to surpass all expectations and create memorable moments that surprise and delight your customers. Your spark is what distinguishes you from the pack and you have the opportunity to be the spark for your company, your customers, and your employees.

That description comes was from author and hall of fame Speaker Simon T. Bailey about his new book where he shares five proven methods to equip people what a simple framework to deliver platinum-level customer experiences. Simon T. Bailey is the breakthrough strategist, whose life’s purpose is to teach one billion plus people how to be fearless and create their future. He equips companies with tools necessary to effect cultural transformation, resulting in higher employee engagement and platinum customer service experiences. Simon has personally worked with more than 1700 organizations in 46 countries since launching Simon T. Bailey International in 2003. Simon has been named one of the top 25 people who will help you reach your business and life goals by Success Magazine and that puts him in an elite list. He joins Brene Brown, Tony Robbins, and Oprah Winfrey. He’s the author of 10 books including the book we’ll talk about today – Be the Spark: Five Platinum Service Principles For Creating Customers For Life. His business building relationships course on Lynda.com com and LinkedIn Learning have been viewed by more than 8,65,000 people worldwide. With that, I want to welcome the amazing Simon T. Bailey.

Simon, thank you for being on the show.

So good to be with you, Eddie. Thank you for the opportunity.

So, Simon, tell us a little bit about your background please.

Well I worked at Disney for a number of years. I was the Sales director for Disney Institute and this ended about 16 years ago to venture out on my own after turning down four jobs, two Vice President offers to go and work at other companies as senior director position with Flexjet a division of Learjet and an internal move at Disney because I answered three questions – What would I do if I knew I couldn’t fail, what would I do if no one paid me to do it, what makes me come alive? So that’s where the spark journey really began for me.

So three powerful questions that you ask yourself. And for my listeners who may not have caught those, can you give us three to us once again please?

What would I do if I knew I couldn’t fail? What would I do if no one paid me to do it? What makes me come alive?

Yeah those are powerful questions. So that led to the journey today.

Correct.

All right. Well, you’ve done quite a bit with answering those three questions for yourself and living those answers. I mean, I just look at the body of work you’ve produced over the last 16 years and I’m just in awe and you are where I aspire to be one of these days. Now, it’s interesting because I did not know you. In fact, you and I still have not met face to face.

Oh my goodness!

I was talking to our mutual friend. I didn’t know we had a mutual friend, Joel Block. One day we were wrapping up a conversation and as we were wrapping up the conversation, Joel says to me “Hey, by the way, do you know Simon T. Bailey?” I said “I know who he is. I mean he’s everywhere and he’s highly regarded. So I know him but I don’t know him personally.” He says “Well, you should know him.” He said “You two are a lot alike.” He said “You have common backgrounds. You have similar idiosyncrasies.” He said “You two need to know each other. Then he made the introduction. So we got to exchange messages and talk to each other but I’m looking forward to meeting you in the National Speakers Association’s upcoming Influence for 2019.

Awesome. Well, I look forward to it as well.

So, now tell me a little bit about your book. You have this new book entitled Be the Spark: Five Platinum Service Principles For Creating Customers For Life.

So we look at all of the different corporations and organizations that we’ve worked with over the last 16 plus years asking the question “What’s the commonality? What’s the red threat that we can pull all the way through those organizations? What is the thing that we continue to notice why customers come back time and time again to a particular brand?” And what we discovered is it’s generally a spark, a man or woman, ownership has been transferred occur to them, psychological ownership has been transferred to them and they have decided to be the reason why customers return. In other words, they are the spark. They are the person who goes the extra edge in how they serve their fellow employees and team members but then ultimately how they impact the customer in a positive way.

Interesting. I hear about organizations transferring ownership to employees where they are owners of the corporation and now they have a vested interest but you said something interesting. You said transfer psychological ownership. Can you talk about that a little bit more?

Yeah. When I way psychological ownership, gone are the days where you show up to do a job and you bring the company your head but “check your heart” at the door. Corporations and businesses that recognize that in order for them to thrive in a competitive environment where consumers and customers and clients are overwhelmed with the terabyte of information, they now must have employees who marry their head, their heart, and their hands to look for ways to take that business further than it’s ever gone before. So it’s that employees who believes that they have the mindset, that “This is my business. This is my team. This is the work we do.” So what happens is they quit their job and they go to work because a paycheck is given to people who show up but opportunities are given to men and women who think beyond what they’re paid to do.

You said that they marry their head, their heart, and their hands and bring that into their deliverables at work.

Correct.

Powerful. I like that. Now, you said you did a lot of research on this and that is what we will see in the book as we read through it. So tell us a little bit more about maybe one of the examples that stands out to you the most.

One of the examples that really hit us hard as we were looking at this, this whole thing of being a spark, Chewy.com is a subscription service for pet lovers and we got a call from a woman who had received her monthly subscription from Chewy.com and she had forgot to cancel it because her dog had died. So she calls Chewy.com to cancel her subscription. Chewy.com apologizes, say “Our thoughts are with you and we will refund your money.” Well, she thought that was the end of the transaction but sure enough the next day there’s a knock at the door and there is a bouquet of flowers and a card, a sympathy card from Chewy.com. In other words, they understood “How do we see an opportunity to be the spark for this woman in a time of bereavement because of her pet.” And it’s that one extra step in being uber responsive to customers that causes, I believe, that woman to be loyal to Chewy.com the next time she gets a pet.

And how about the countless number of times that she then tells other people about that experience and what that will do pet lovers everywhere who hear about it?

Exactly. See literally becomes the unofficial marketing department for Chewy.com and they will not send her a check at the end of the year for her free advertisement but she’ll do it because they sparked something in her that connected her with the brand that no matter what their price is, they now have an emotional connection.

I like how you said that as well. That’s a nice turn of phrase – “She becomes the unofficial marketing department for Chewy.com.” I love that.

Correct.

I know what comes to my mind when you say spark but I suspect that you had a very clear imagery that moved you to use that in the title. Can you share why you said back as you’ve used it a couple of times in your description here and I just would love to crystallize that for our listeners?

Yeah. So a few years ago when I was starting on this whole journey of spark, I went to the Grand Cayman Islands to speak at an event. I’m checking in at the front desk and they say “Your room’s not ready. Can you wait in the lounge?” So, I’m waiting in the lounge area and a gentleman woman walks over to me, his name is Howard, and Howard gives me his card and he says “I’m going to take care of you while you’re here at the Ritz Carlton Grand Cayman.” I said “Great.” So we started talking and then Harvard says to me, Eddie, he says “How was your trip to Halifax, Nova Scotia?” And I looked at him like “How did you know I was at Halifax, Nova Scotia?” And he says to me “Before you arrived to the island and to the hotel, I went on your Instagram feed to see where you were before you got here. And I happen to be from Halifax, Nova Scotia.” Well, now, as you can imagine, Eddie, in this moment Howard is now my new BFF, all of a sudden we have this connection. And so there is a famous restaurant in Halifax, Nova Scotia, called the Bicycle Thief and he said “Did you get a chance to go to the restaurant?” And I’m “On my goodness, did I go? I went there twice. It was amazing. Loved it.” And so eventually I get checked in my room and I have to go to a Black Tie event later on at night and there’s a button missing from my jacket. I call Howard. He comes to get the jacket, brings it back in 10 minutes with the button sewn on that matched the rest of my buttons. I’m going to give him a 10-dollar tip to say “Thank you.” He said “No, this is on me.” I’m like “Howard, you’re the man” but the story gets better. The next night I’m taking a group of acquaintance out to dinner and we run into Howard in the lobby of a hotel and he says “Hey where are you going?” I said “We’re going to such and such restaurant.” He said “That’s a Canadian restaurant here in the Cayman Islands. Make sure you order the Flying Monkey beer.” In other words, Howard went beyond the job description of why he was hired to work there at the Ritz Carlton and connected with me as a guest. He became the spark for me because he began to think, not just do. And it’s that slight shift and if the 20th century customer service is about going the extra mile, in the 21st century, platinum service is going the extra inch. There are six inches between your ears. So when I began to think about what I do, I just don’t show up to do it, I begin to go that extra inch and that’s what we want people to do, in order words, in order to be the spark.

So it’s no longer about going the extra mile. In great 21st century leadership and great 21st customer experiences, we’re going to go the extra inch.

Correct.

Excellent. That is fantastic. So this idea of sparking, being the igniter started in the Cayman Islands because of a man named Howard. How about that?

Exactly.

You then fast forward and you write this book about it where you’ve collected a research and you share other stories. The big thing that some listeners may be thinking right now as they’re hearing you is “How can I become a spark?”

Oh my goodness, great question. So one of the things we started over the last few weeks, we feature Spark Of the Week and it’s just somebody who’s either been nominated by other individuals or it’s something that I noticed in my travels that somebody does. Recently I was at the Atlanta Hartsfield Jackson Airport. Almost 85 million passengers pass through that airport on an annual basis. And I’m standing at the gate and about to board my flight, I notice there’s a gentlemen sitting in a wheelchair. Well, I have to go to the desk because I hear my name called and straighten up something in my ticket, I just notice this guy just sitting in his wheelchair looking a little bit discomforted, looked uncomfortable, wasn’t really happy and all of a sudden I see a gentleman come over to talk to the gate agent and he says to her “Listen, I’m going to put my back’s right here and I’m going to take care of this guy.” And he rolls this gentleman off and he’s not a airport employees, he’s just a regular passenger about to get on the same flight. Well, I said to the gate agent, I said “What exactly is he doing?” She said “That gentleman has been sitting in that wheelchair uncomfortable because he wanted to go to the restroom and this guy noticed it and has now taken him to the restroom” and I was blown away. We’ll, sure enough the guy comes back, he rolls the gentlemen back because the gentlemen’s wheelchair’s going to also get on the same flight. And I just walk over to him and I said “Sir I don’t know you. What’s your name?” He says “My name is Mike Mitchell.” And Mike is the Division President of a company. And I said “That was amazing what you just did to go above and beyond, just that human act to move beyond yourself.” Well, mike didn’t have a card but I connected with him on LinkedIn and I told him how much I enjoyed meeting him and that I was going to make him the spark of the week. Put it on social media.

How about that?

Because I happened to take a picture of him rolling this guy through the airport. I made a quick video at the airport about what I just witnessed. It’s just that little act of kindness, that’s how you become a spark. You look for the opportunity to do something when no one is looking, not for the praise but because of the good of humanity.

How much different would our world be if we had more people taking the initiative to be the spark? I really liked that example. Thank you for sharing that. And since you’re doing this every week, I imagine you just have countless of these that you could talk about and share.

Oh my goodness, we just have stories after stories of just different things that individuals are doing just to be the spark. I was recently speaking at a conference and I had told everybody about the spark of the week. I’d asked everybody to give me their business cards – “Let’s stay in contact.” If they notice someone being the spark, I want to know about it. And I’m standing out at valet parking and this little young lady comes over to me, can be no more than 8 years of age, gives me her business card with the title on it Commissioner in Training. And I stooped down and I said “Tell me, Paisley, about yourself.” and she said “I’m here attending this conference with my grandmother.” Her grandmother is the Commissioner of Accounting here in the state of Florida. And she said “You didn’t ask for my business card and I want to give you my business card because I want to be a commissioner one day.” Eight years of age. Well, sure enough, Paisley was the spark of the week because somehow her grandmother found a way to embed the chip early through her actions and behaviors that you can aspire for what you see. And so everybody can be the spark. You can do something, be something, go after it.

And by being the spark, that gets at the heart of what we talk about in the Keep Leading Podcast of being a leader. So you’ve talked about that initiative, going the extra inch, no longer the extra mile. So tell us just very specifically if you could about the reason this is so important for leaders.

The reason this is so important for leaders is because the job of a leader is to invite men and women on a journey to discover the leader within themselves while they’re following you. So a leader can never take a person to a place that he or she has not been themselves ourselves. So before I can tell others to be the spark, I must show up as the spark for those that I work with every single day. So being a leader with spark is finding out what’s right about a person instead of what’s wrong with a person and infusing them and igniting their potential to go that extra edge because of what they see in you. So, in other words, a leader comes alongside every person and coaches them into their brilliant future.

Excellent, excellent. I love it you. What you’re saying resonates with me on so many levels. And in some ways it almost becomes for some people, would you say, almost spiritual?

Very much so, yeah. Years ago I shared the stage, I was just a young pup starting out in this business and I share the stage with the late great Dr. Steven Covey and he said something that I will never forgive for the rest of my life. He said “We’re not human beings have a spiritual experience. We’re spirit beings having a human experience.” And when he said it, it just left an imprint on me that I said “The work that we do in leadership is more spiritual than anything because people are connecting with our spirits. That’s how they’re learning to lead.”

Very, very good. Well we’re talking to the amazing the international renowned hall of Fame speaker Simon T. Bailey. And Simon T. Bailey is telling us about the importance about being the spark.So we’ll take a break right now for a word from our sponsors and we’ll come right back with Mr. Simon T. Bailey.

All right, we’re back and we’re talking to be internationally renowned hall of fame speaker, author Simon T. Bailey. And Simon is telling us how we can be the spark and why this is important for leaders and for anyone who wants to take their relationships and their level of customer or employee experience to a platinum level.Now before we took a break, Simon, you were telling us about the germination of the idea of being the spark but in your book you explained five platinum service principles for creating customers for life. Can you share those five principles with us, please?

Principal Number One – For every customer, team member that you work with, see them as guest and see them as guests kind of ties into my the Disney background, my 30 years of being in the hospitality industry. When you see a person as a guest, it’s not about what you can get from them but it’s about what you can give to them.The second principle is how do you personalize that experience and personalization is really understanding that everybody that you serve has a compass, they have a need, a want, a style, and an emotion.

And then the third principle is how do you anticipate their future needs by asking quality questions because the quality of your questions determines the quality of your answers. Anticipating future needs is the ability to look around the corner and to see what’s coming and then how do you begin to shift and shape the experience and the outcomes that you want that person that you’re serving to have.

The fourth principle principal is how do we respond immediately. In a world where now with just a few clicks and a few touches and swipes people can lift a brand up or tear a brand down through their recommendation, through their feedback on bad experience. So when things happen, if you hear it, you own it. No longer can employees pass the customer’s problem around like a hot potato. If you hear it, you own it. You make it happen. Fix it here, fix it now.

And then the final principle is after we are uber responsive, how do we keep the loyal with acts of kindness. So what you’ll notice is that every letter in what I’ve just teed up – Sea them guests, Personalize experience, Anticipate their needs, Respond immediately, and Keep them loyal with kindness – spell the word SPARK. So when you find a way to go about implementing that, it just doesn’t become rote or mechanical but it becomes a part of our ethos and how we show up every single day.

Just amazing, just absolutely amazing. I love the concept, I like how you tied that to your acronym, and it gives us all something that we can apply, and everything you said just resonates really, has my mind going at 100 miles an hour. And I’m thinking about your Disney experience. I’m thinking about my short time with Apple. And when you said that if you hear it, you own it, that was the first time when I went through my training at Apple that someone explicitly explained that to us. And it’s not about “I’m going to tell you what number to call or go see this person go over there.” No, you take ownership immediately and you go with that person, you are now tasked with being their guide until it is completed. And then if, it is necessary to do a hand-off, you still go back and you follow up. So I love that.Now, so many things that you’ve accomplished I would just love to talk about but something else that I just cannot ignore, we have to talk about. You did a Goal Cast video. And for those who may not know about Goalcast, they just take a speech that someone has given and they just do a phenomenal job of bringing that to life in another way. And they often will get many views but your video did not get many views. Yours got millions. And at last count, at least from what I saw, it’s been viewed more than 85 million times. And you called that one Invest In Love. So without going into the content just yet, what I’d love you to do is just tell me what it’s like to have something you’ve produced be viewed that many times?

It’s very humbling. It also causes you to come to new level of accountability because it’s one thing to have a speech go viral but who you are when no one is looking is who you really are. So when the cameras and the lights are not on, the audience is not giving an applause, and you’re not being interviewed, who are you really and are you living out what you have taught that’s gone viral? And so, what I have recognized because what I shared that day is certainly who I am at the core of my being. I’ve even doubled down even more to be intentional about how I am focusing on family first, business second.

Very nice. Now, I want people to go watch it for the few people that haven’t seen it yet because it seems like everybody has but for the few that haven’t seen it, I want them to go watch it. So I don’t want to give away your full content but can you just give us a summary of what they will learn when they go watch that video and you’ve kind of said it here just now?

So the quick snippet is my daughter came into my home office one day and I could see she wanted to talk but I was busy, I was not affected for her and she said “Daddy, I see you’re. I’ll just talk to you later” and I said “Okay” but it hit me on the plane that I missed the moment to connect with my daughter. And so what I discovered, and when they watch the video, they’ll get the rest of the story, what I discovered was sometimes we can be so caught up in the minutia of what we do that we never keep the main thing the main thing. And the reality is, for everyone that listening to us right now, god forbid if you kick the bucket, expire, or checkout tomorrow, they will post your job on the internal intranet and life will go on. And the people that will be crying at your funeral will be the ones that missed you the most, your family. So, I believe, Eddie, we’re living in a time that if you’re going to be an effective leader, become better at home, then you become better for the business because if the business is more important than home, then you have built a ladder that is against the wrong wall. So when you keep the main thing the main thing, you discover how to become a holistic leader that lives from the inside out not just the outside in.

Powerful, powerful. And that’s a lesson that some only learn when it’s too late. So it’s outstanding to see that you learned that lesson and you’ve applied it and I’m sure that your family is all the better as a result and as you talked about yourself being a better person and what we have to ask ourselves as leaders who are we in private because that really is who we are in public. It’s not that we can pretend and then show up as somebody different. We may only be deluding ourselves but other people are seeing the real person.

Exactly.

So there’s something else you’re known for and a lot of people follow you and I look at these as well and enjoy these, your Bailey Dailies. Now, I don’t want to put you on a spot but I know you put these out every day. Have you done your Daily Bailey for today?

Yes, I have. We’ve done the Bailey Daily today and this is not the best form but it shows me coming out of Orange Theory Fitness Center where I went to a 6 a.m. class and I’m huffing and puffing and I’m sweating and I think I ate too much the night before and hadn’t been to the gym in a while. And so that’s my Bailey Daily as to what are you going to go after because, from me, I’ve got a little bread basket that I’ve developed around my belly and some love handles that have got to go. So I’m trying to get back to my six pack in my mind, it’s a ten pack right now, but I’m trying to work it out.

I have that myself. I totally understand and it is not easy. I just gave up. So that was your Bailey Daily.

Yes, it was.

Very cool, very cool. I just love talking to you. What am I missing? What would you say that every listener should know who’s hearing us talk about leadership, when you’re talking about being the spark, how would you summarize our conversation for today?

I would say everyone listening to us today needs to think about “How do I show up and be the spark not just in how I see the world but how do I surround myself with a vertical thinker if I’m a horizontal thinker?” What do I mean? A horizontal thinker can look at a myriad of different things and connect the dots but a vertical thinker like a doctor or a lawyer, they have subject matter expertise that might be an inch wide but it’s a mile deep. So an example of a horizontal thinker is when you look at Steve Jobs, Steve jobs was a horizontal thinker because he was able to disrupt three different industries – music, movies, and the mobile phone. And being a horizontal thinker he connected all the dots but he also was surrounded by vertical thinkers. So if you intend to be the spark right now and to really keep leading, how do you release the need from having to be the smartest person in the room and creating an environment where everyone matters and everyone can show up. They might be a vertical thinker, they might be a horizontal thinker but ultimately it creates that spark to get the best thinking that needs to show up and be a solution to a problem.

I love it. I love it. I’ve said first we try to do this episode, I’m sure, and anybody who sees you on stage, you come alive and that’s why you’re a hall of fame speaker. I mean, you’ve spoken on in so many countries on several continents and you know how to engage an audience and you have just solid content. You know how to motivate people and that’s why you are the breakthrough strategist.So what’s your favorite quote? On the Keep Leading Podcast we love share a quote to help us as leaders keep leading.

Well, the well that you drink from is the well that you think from and eventually it’s the well that you become. So if you want to understand where a person is drawing their thinking, their knowledge, their ability, look at the well that they’re drinking from because that tells you everything you need to know.

Wow! I like that. Thank you. And I don’t often do this on the show, in fact I’ve never done this in the show, but I’m going to insert my favorite quote at this point that I got from Simon T. Bailey himself. As I was watching one of your videos when I was preparing for the show and you said “When I work in an environment that celebrates me rather that tolerates me, that environment invites me to be a vitamin and not just an aspirin.” I thought that was powerful. So I want all leaders to remember that one as well.Also, Simon, there was something that you had mentioned when we were just talking before the show began from your Disney days from Al Weiss that I thought would be really nice for our listeners to know.

Awesome. So, Al really challenged me when he was president and CEO to really look at what I was doing through a fresh lens and to really understand that you need to know who you are and why you’re here. And when he said it, it just went over my head but after about a decade I got it because it wasn’t just about showing up and getting a job at Disney, it took me two years to get hired at Disney, but it’s really understanding that I wasn’t there to fill a position, I was there to create a moment.

Not there to just fill a position but to create a moment. Good stuff, good stuff. So thank you for sharing that.Where can my listeners learn more about you, Simon?

Yeah, they can go to SimonTBailey.com.

Wonderful. I’m going to put that in the show notes so that everybody can simply click on that and go out to your website, learn more about you. You want to book Simon T. Bailey for your audience, ladies and gentlemen. Bring him into your organizations.And also they want to get that book of yours that was just released and that’s available on your sit, it’s also available on Amazon.com. So, we’re going to encourage folks to be able to go out and pick up a copy of the book.

And I’m also going to put in the show notes, for the few people that haven’t seen it, your Goalcast video. I’m going to put a link to that so that they can be able to see that as well. And if you have seen it in the past, it’s worth watching again.

Simon, thank you so much for being on the Keep Leading Podcast.

Eddie, thank you so much for having me and blessings to you.

Thank you so much. And thank you for listening. That concludes this episode, everyone. I’m Eddie Turner, the Leadership Excelerator, reminding you that leadership is not about our title or our position. Leadership is an activity. Leadership is action. It’s not the case of once a leader, always a leader. It’s not a garment we put on and take off. We must be a leader at our core and allow it to emanate in all we do. So whatever you’re doing, always keep leading.